The 2019 Consumer Packaged Goods Industry Report is here! It’s full of consumer insight that will drive sales this holiday season – and well into 2020. And we have a preview to get you excited about the possibilities!
CPG Gold Rush
Jumping right in, let’s kick it off strong with some stats from the report that offer amazing potential:
- According to Investopedia, The CPG industry is one of the largest industries in North America, with average annual revenue in 2018 exceeding $2 Trillion dollars!
- The industry is evolving with more consumers changing how they purchase products, with over $58.6 Billion of sales in 2018 being made online, showing an increase of 35.4% in 2018
So which subcategories of this overarching CPG vertical are most loved online – and which have areas to work on – immediately? The report details strengths and challenges that each of the selected subcategories face. But wait – what are those subcategories again?
Here you go:
It’s important to note, the “average sentiment by category” shown above is just that – a score from -100 to 100 for each brand in each category, averaged. It does not reflect share of voice, nor share of list! Some may be inversely proportional, actually. That part is something we’ll leave for you to discover in the report.
But we can share some tasty tidbits from each as area for now . . .
CPG Subcategories
The Beauty Category shares consumer reviews of products people love – and love to hate. That last part is important as it reveals intel about consumers’ unmet needs, which is insight any challenger brand can exploit.
Dove has lots of love in this category, and the most mentions. But, its Net Sentiment was edged out by another brand contender.
And this brand’s mega-love relates back to a product that was initially launched in November of 2018! They’re sorted by price, ingredients and cruelty-free. It’s super informative.
The Kitchen Appliances category is dominated by one super handy product this year. Can you guess what it is? It not only dominates online mentions, but also captures the most love from folks with busy lives and little time to cook, which probably describes everyone. Keurig has the lowest sentiment, and it seems to have nothing to do with its actual products! This shows how much everything you do can (and will) affect your brand’s perception online – regardless of how well you do your niche “thing.”
Winning Hearts & Minds
The Cleaning category gives a nod to environmentalism, which is a huge CPG concern (and online, in general concern), with Seventh Generation leading in sentiment. It’s also challenging other brands with lots of conversation mentioning a “switch” to the green cleaning products.
Toys are always a competitive category, particularly at this time of year. Which gaming platform has won the hearts, minds (and ultimately, dollars) of shoppers so far this season? There’s one that stands out as “best in market” according to consumer insight!
Top sentiment in this category goes to toddler retailer, Melissa and Doug. Why? It’s not just because they have babies in their pictures, though it certainly doesn’t hurt:
Food and Beverage is a category with lots of conversation – always. Eating and drinking are simple pleasures in life. Consumers’ photo-first social media sharing makes understanding what is resonating easier, but certainly not obvious – particularly from a competitor standpoint:
Context Matters
What does #ChickenNoodleSoup have to do with Sprite, for example? Nothing they planned, mostly likely! And this trending term offers a great example of why brands need to monitor mentions online as this one is indexing very high – and for good reason!
Would any of these trending terms (above) seem likely for soda? Probably not, but they’re super important to have the pulse of to ensure audience understanding and inform future campaigns! Also important for pivoting in the moment.
And that’s what makes the report such a neat bit of intel too – it demonstrates how sentiment analysis is done and also how it’s applied. A two-fer.
How did we decide which brands to include on the list? Our methodology is pretty intense.
Methodology for List Inclusion
To rate a mention on the list, we looked at 55 of the world’s most loved CPG brands to see how they perform across key metrics including mentions, posts, potential impressions, sentiment and engagement over a year’s time. The tracking spanned October 1st, 2018–October 1st, 2019, and results were in English only.
The brands were all ranked per each score, and then given a cumulative score. Brands that have a high volume of mentions have a good chance of making it to the top ten, but they also need to have high net sentiment and engagements, helping normalize the total score. Brands that lead in volume of mentions are also prone to getting more customer complaints with negative sentiment, therefore, smaller brands who might have less mentions still have the ability to make it into the top ten by doing well in sentiment and engagements.
And then apply AI Studio to our analysis, which we did, and uncover even more!
AI Studio’s Automated Themes for CPG
Underlying themes related to any brand or topic can offer insight around trends that drive consumers’ purchasing decisions or brand affinities. NetBase’s next generation AI-powered analytics offer best-in-class accuracy around topic/theme searches, and there are always unknowns out there – things that can significantly impact a business if caught unaware.
And there are things that brands may miss out on purely due to human bias. Things we may search for, and trends we may pursue, when using an accurate and transparent social listening tool may not surface additional valuable, related insight. Automated theme discovery resolves that very real concern.
Artificial intelligence has no such bias and can apply its machine learning, expert systems and deep learning capabilities to create predictive opportunities. And these instances will soon be table stakes, as our AI capabilities are expanding every day.
Most social analytics tools cannot make this claim – not honestly, at least! And this report bears that out. It’s all that and a bag of chips, be sure to download it today!
And reach out if you have questions or seek to experience the same success leading brands are creating for themselves. It’s all possible with next generation AI-powered social analytics on your side!
